WWE legends perform at Chaparral Center in fundraiser

Jonathan Hull|Sports Writer

Published 7:11 pm, Sunday, April 15, 2012

It wasn't long ago that West Texas was considered a hot bed for professional wrestling. It was once an area where wrestling legends such as Dory Funk Jr., Terry Funk, Ted DiBiase and Dick Murdoch made their names.

But, the times of small promotions such as the one run by Dory Funk Sr. based in Amarillo and Joe Blanchard's Southwest Championship Wrestling based out of San Antonio that toured throughout West Texas are all but extinct.

Nowadays, the only consistent touring brand of professional wrestling is Vince McMahon's World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) and that organization's stops in West Texas are few and far between.

However, a WWE Hall of Famer and a few other well known legends of the industry recently paid a visit to Midland in support of a small wrestling school based in Odessa, bringing back some fond memories for those involved.

Old School Wrestling hosted a wrestling event at Chaparral Center on Friday in an attempt to raise funds for the Midland High Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps (JROTC). Headlining the event was former five-time WWE World Heavyweight Champion Bret "The Hitman" Hart.

Just the opportunity to get back to Texas and try to help an independent promotion was enough to get Hart to Midland.

"If I get a chance, I always try to do what I can for the small promotions across the world. I just had a little signing thing in Canada, but I'd honestly rather be here," the Canadian-born Hart said. "It's great to be back here in a place where I don't always get to come very often. I have a lot of fans in Texas."

Just being back in area brought back fond memories for Hart, who recalled a match he had with "The Million Dollar Man" Ted DiBiase in 1989 at Ector County Coliseum. The match ended in a double countout according to Primetime Wrestling magazine.

Yet, while the match didn't result in a victory, Hart believes it helped launch him out of the tag team ranks, where he was greatly successful with Jim "The Anvil" Neidhart as The Hart Foundation, and into the single ranks, where he became the biggest name in the industry during the mid-1990s.

"I had a great match with Ted DiBiase (in Odessa), I'll never forget it. Probably in a lot of ways that match helped launch my career more than anything I ever did in tag team," Hart said. "Probably even more so than the matches I had with Mr. Perfect (Curt Hennig).

"I couldn't really get them to give me much of a shot back in those days and it seemed like the match I had with Ted DiBiase was the first time I remember feeling like I really proved something, that they were going to do something with me. So West Texas always brings a happy face, good memories for me."

Several of the other former WWE stars in attendance, which included Bushwhaker Luke, Charlie Haas and Doink the Clown, share the same fond memories of performing in West Texas.

"I'm glad to be here and it's for a great cause," said Luke Williams, who was one-half of former WWE Tag Team Champions The Bushwhackers, and was a last-minute addition to the card, replacing Al Snow. "Odessa and Midland, I haven't been back here for years, but I used to come here every week for Joe Blanchard's Southwest Wrestling out of San Antonio. It's great to be back here."

Even current wrestling stars like Charlie Haas, who performs for independent promotion Ring of Honor as one-half of the World's Greatest Tag Team, is excited to see a small promotion sprouting up in West Texas once again.

"It's my honor. I'm a fellow Texan, born and raised. I wanted to help build on, with whatever I can contribute, to what wrestling used to be here," Haas said. "Texas used to be such a great wrestling state with so many different wrestling territories within the state. It's died so much lately, I think it's great to promote it and build it back."

Whether Old School Wrestling can turn into a promotion that brings back prominence to professional wrestling in the area remains to be seen. For now, the wrestling school's owner and promoter Dredd, who has more than 15 years experience working in the industry, is hoping to pass down to a younger generation the love for a more traditional style of wrestling that many older fans of the sport have been missing.

"I have a good job. I don't do this for the money," said Dredd, who opened the school in Odessa two years ago and competed in his final match at Friday's event. "I do this because I love it. It's always been my first love. Mainly, this is structured for fundraisers and charities and allows me to teach it the way I was taught."

And, as for the school's 13 to 15 students, most of whom were a part of Friday's event, being on the same card with such legends as Hart, Haas, Doink and Pat Tanaka was an honor hard to put into words.

"I never imagined being a part of something like this at all," said Aaron Harmes, a 17-year-old Midland High JROTC?student who wrestles under the name Cash Commodity and proposed the fundraiser. "I thought there would be some big stars, but not someone like Bret Hart. Being on an undercard with a guy like that, it's breathtaking."